15th August 2015.We’re in Tokyo, Japan for our second evening in Sumo Hall. Block A concluded last night with Hiroshi Tanahashi winning the Block by defeating AJ Styles. This evening sees the conclusion of Block B and things aren’t quite so simple there.BLOCK B:Kazuchika Okada 14Karl Anderson 12Hirooki Goto 12Shinsuke Nakamura 12Tomohiro Ishii 8Michael Elgin 8Yujiro Takahashi 4Satoshi Kojima 4Yuji Nagata 4Tomoaki Honma 2The key matches are as follows: Okada vs. Nakamura, Goto vs. Nagata and Anderson vs. Kojima. If Okada wins the Block is over. If Nakamura beats Okada it opens up a chance for the other two. Both Goto and Anderson must win to stand a chance to capturing the Block and need a favour from Nakamura as well. Should Nak, Goto and the Machine Gun all win their bouts we’ll have a four-way tie. This is highly unlikely but, as far as I can reckon, it will mean Karl Anderson advances to the G1 Final. This is based on the records the wrestlers have against each other. Goto and Okada would be both 1-2 against the other contenders while Nakamura and Anderson would be 2-1. And who won their match? Anderson. Goto can still make the Final too but only if Anderson loses and Nakamura wins. This would open up an unprecedented three-way tie where everyone would be 1-1. Presumably this would result in a tie-breaking three-way dance on Sunday’s show. Got all that? Good.“Yo-yo, start wres!” Sho Tanaka & Yohei Komatsu vs. reDRagon (Kyle O’Reilly & Bobby Fish)The Young Lions are rewarded for hard work throughout the tour by being included in undercard tags. I’m aware Tanaka has spent most of this tour in NOAH but if he had been around he’d have been as good as the rest. If you’re wondering how he did; he won one match…against Kumano, NOAH’s in-house youngest of young boys. Komatsu has grown in stature during G1. He was good to begin with but now he shows no fear whatsoever and looks content to square off with O’Reilly. Komatsu’s improvement has been such, both physically and mentally, that I would totally buy him winning matches against regular roster members. Sho Tanaka is looking significantly more muscular too. Those Young Lions have been blasting the weight machines by the looks of it. There’s a sensational spot in this one where O’Reilly is wailing away on Komatsu, who’s got Fish in a half crab, with slaps and Tanaka German suplexes him. As O’Reilly is going over he’s still hitting those slaps. Obviously reDRagon have an enormous advantage in terms of experience and quality and Chasing the Dragon finishes but both Young Lions looked terrific. Final Rating: ***The Young Bucks vs. Jay White & David FinlayWe must be running short on time as the Bucks jump reDRagon and White & Finlay run in for the save to start match #2. Matt manages to get a “that was awesome” chant going during the match. He’s a heel people, don’t cheer him! Matt goes on to call Finlay a “job boy”. If the roles were reversed, I’d have put Komatsu & Tanaka over the Bucks. That’s how far advanced they are. Jay continues his progression here, showing off his definition and personality. The Bucks put Jay away with the Indytaker. Was the show running long already? This whole match and sequence around it felt rushed. O’Reilly & Fish run back in after the match to help sell the Junior Tag Title match tomorrow night. Final Rating: **1/4The Kingdom (Michael Bennett & Matt Taven) & CHAOS (Toru Yano, Kazushi Sakuraba & YOSHI-HASHI) vs. Bullet Club (AJ Styles, Bad Luck Fale, Doc Gallows, Tama Tonga & Cody Hall)The Kingdom have a green theme this evening, which is even better than the red outfit that Maria wore last night. This is the first of two ten-man tags tonight as NJPW tries to squeeze the entire roster onto the card. Bullet Club have shown some dissention during G1 but they’re on the same page here, even if the crowd are totally into AJ Styles above all others. Tama continues his excellent work during G1, slithering around and doing some freaky mannerisms. His character has grown so much and it’s been down to his delivery. AJ vs. Saku is teased during this match and it looks all kinds of great. The counters are amazing. Is that on the cards for an upcoming PPV? NJPW seem to keep forgetting about Sakuraba. His run hasn’t had enough great moments, considering his incredible skill set. YOSHI-HASHI picks off Cody for the senton and the hodge-podge team of Kingdom and CHAOS pick up the win. The big story here is AJ vs. Sakuraba. At some point that *must* happen. Saku needs to be booked better by New Japan. Final Rating: **1/2 Tetsuya Naito, Kota Ibushi, Manabu Nakanishi, Ricochet & Captain New Japan vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi, Katsuyori Shibata, Hiroyoshi Tenzan, Togi Makabe & KUSHIDAThis bout features a big chunk of the competitors from the completed Block A, including Block winner Tanahashi and breakout star Naito. For me the moment I’m waiting for is Shibata vs. Ibushi as their match was amazing in the Blocks. KUSHIDA & Ricochet decide their match tomorrow needs more shilling and they go at it. It’s smooth, slick and crazy fun to watch. Their match tomorrow is going to rock. Shibata and Ibushi is amazing, again, and they do a boxing style kick-fest before going to the mat and it’s all so fucking fantastic. One of them needs to win a title so they can feud over it. Any title, don’t care. To keep matters fresh there are plenty of tags and everyone gets match time. As the match breaks down everyone runs in for spots and it becomes absolute carnage. The only guy not involved is Naito, who stands on the apron looking bored…so Shibata kicks him in the face! CNJ gets picked off for the High Fly Flow and that’s it. Lots of fun action during this. Shibata tries to murder Naito for his disrespectful attitude and hammers him with the PK before returning to the ring. Tenzan’s supporting slap on the back is wonderful. Then Shibata sits there in the ring, as if to say ‘this is my house, bitch’ and Naito walks off holding his throat. Message sent! Final Rating: ***1/2G1 Climax 25 Block BYujiro Takahashi vs. Tomoaki HonmaPre-Match Pick: Honma! Let the winning streak begin. Yujiro has Mao with him and she’s wearing next to nothing. If this was a bra and panties match it’d already be over. Yujiro grinds away throughout the match, as he has done throughout the tour. Honma tends to time his comebacks when the crowd are at their most bored. The comebacks include a slew of Kokeshi’s. Not the barrage that Ishii received nor is this match anywhere near that one for quality or atmosphere. Honma starts kicking out at one and no selling. HONMANIA IS RUNNING WILD! Yujiro goes low and finishes with Miami Shine. Oh, fuck you Gedo. Final Rating: **1/2KOKESHI COUNT – 3 missed. 3 hit.SUPER KOKESHI COUNT – 1 missed. Picks: 62/86G1 Climax 25 Block BMichael Elgin vs. Tomohiro Ishii Pre-Match Pick: Ishii. This is more like it as Ishii and Elgin wash the bad taste of that last match out of our collective mouths with a strongstyle display of two big muscular guys bouncing off each other. Two sides of beef colliding in the squared circle. Elgin has taken to throwing punches but not like Makabe, not Western punches, but shoot-style punches. Ishii sells them like a motherfucker too, slumping to the mat with each one. Elgin wows the crowd with his power, then with his strongstyle, then with his ability off the ropes. The commentators compare him to Bam Bam Bigelow and the fans love the guy. Normally Ishii, when outmatched, can throw enough lumber to keep him in it but Elgin’s variety of skills makes it very hard for the one-dimensional Ishii to get into it. I mean ‘one-dimensional’ in a nice way as Ishii covers the best dimension with his violent approach. The match is a belter, with both guys going full-tilt into business. Lots of power moves, lots of striking. It’s my kind of match. When Ishii decides to stop selling and marches into Elgin’s elbows it makes me happier than almost anything in the entire tournament. Then ELGIN DOES IT BACK TO ISHII! I’m getting goosebumps. They absolutely wail on each other. It’s fucking brilliant. Elgin even gets in a sneaky piece of psychology by working Ishii’s neck and shoulder with all his spots. Ishii has a history of injuries in those areas and because the tournament is nearly over Ishii can afford to take a few sickening bumps, including a borderline careless powerbomb into the rail. It’s a war of attrition. The strikes are just amazing, combined with both guys desire to sell the importance of the match, even though it’ll count for nothing other than pride. Elgin kicks out of the lariat at one after completely no selling a superplex and this match has me, hook, line and sinker. Ishii goes to the HEADBUTTS and another LARIATOOOOO but Elgin kicks out again! BRAINBUSTAAAAAAAAAA and #BigMike finally stays down. This was fucking brilliant. There have been a few complaints about this year’s G1 and that they’d not had one of those ‘blow-away’ Block matches like in the previous two years. Well, fuck you guys. This was it. Full boat. A blizzard in August. Final Rating: *****Picks: 63/87G1 Climax 25 Block BYuji Nagata vs. Hirooki GotoPre-Match Pick: Nagata, the spoiler. Otherwise Goto might actually sneak into some sort of tie-breaker match and that’s probably not going to happen. After the last match and the blistering pace they established, Goto and Nagata sensibly start out quite slowly. Just to give the crowd a chance to recover. Nagata has a story built in thanks to his injured ribs and Goto ends up slipping into that match without thinking about it. I love Nagata’s consistency in selling the ribs. He always reaches for the same spot. The match is less about thrills and spills and more about the outcome as we’re into the business end of the Block now. Goto has a shot at winning but has to beat Nagata. The story they tell is one of a cagey contest. Goto isn’t ruthless enough, cautious he doesn’t want to make a mistake and get trapped in an armbar (like he did against Nakamura). Goto seems in perfect control of the situation, wearing Nagata down and controlling the pace, using Nagata’s ribs to his advantage. But Nagata always has that armbar and he uses kicks to help set it up. Kicks and subterfuge. Goto can always go to the ribs if he gets into trouble, which gets him out of the Backdrop Driver. Despite this Nagata kicks Goto in the head a few times and finishes with the Backdrop Driver. This took ages to get going, probably due to them having to live up to the last match but when it did it got pretty good. Final Rating: ***1/4 Picks: 64/88G1 Climax 25 Block BKarl Anderson vs. Satoshi KojimaPre-Match Pick: Kojima. Another spoiler veteran. Otherwise Karl is on the verge of another G1 Final. If he wins this, Nakamura is eliminated. That’s big stakes. Anderson looks at Kojima as being in his way and hopes he can polish Satoshi off in record time. When that doesn’t pan out for him, Karl goes to work on Kojima’s lariat arm to eliminate the threat. It doesn’t work and Kojima is soon unloading with the Machine Gun chops on the Machine Gun. Kojima came in hurt and has tape on that right arm but he’s not past switching to his left arm for certain spots. Karl gets fed up with that approach anyway and opts to start working over Kojima’s neck instead, thus setting up his own finish. It’s a shrewd tactic. The arm stuff was going nowhere and he was never getting a submission with it. Kojima ends up battering Anderson with the lariat, bad arm or not, and getting the pin. Anderson’s psychology was fine during the match but there are question marks over Kojima and selling in general during this tournament has been suspect (Nagata’s ribcage aside). Final Rating: ***Picks: 65/89G1 Climax 25 Block BShinsuke Nakamura vs. Kazuchika Okada Pre-Match Pick: Nakamura. The winner of this match wins Block B and goes on to face Tanahashi to contest this year’s G1 Final. Two CHAOS brothers battling each other in a repeat of last year’s G1 Final. A match won by Okada, the current IWGP champion. Okada goes for his normal ‘clean break’ spot and the look on Nakamura’s face is that of a man who’s incredibly unimpressed. Okada had trouble doing poses because of injuries just yesterday but breaks out his Rainmaker pose to show Nakamura something, he’s 100%, or as near as you can be on Day Eighteen of the G1. This leads right into Nak ducking an early attempt at the Rainmaker and a glimpse of how amazing this match could get. It’s not about what lands, it’s about what doesn’t as they show their familiarity with each other. It’s Okada who begins true hostilities by putting Nakamura in holds that indirectly put pressure on Nak’s bad arm and follows that with Nakamura’s “Vibration” taunt. Oh, it’s on now! The crowd turn on Okada for that. Fickle fans. I thought it was great. Nakamura steps his game up after that, finding different angles to assault Okada from, throwing kicks and knees to keep the champ off-guard. Okada is not easily phased and takes every opening to hit spots. Heavy Rain, the top rope dropkick and finally a Tombstone on the floor. Any time the opening arrives, he takes it, regardless of situation. Savage Elbow…RAINMAKER POSE! Nakamura kicks his way out of that and then knees Okada in the jaw to stop a counter. Both guys take a break and they’ve been busting a gut out there. When they get back up it’s time for the striking section of the match and Okada looks fresher. He’s younger and he’s been carrying less injuries around during G1. Despite this Nakamura is desperate for the win and throws everything at Okada, disrupting Okada’s usual calm approach. Nakamura’s weakness is feeling the need to create distance to enhance the Boma Ye and that gives Okada an opening for the dropkick. Rainmaker is blocked by Nak grabbing the arm. TOMBSTONE! Another RAINMAKER POSE! RAINMAKER INTO THE FLYING ARMBAR! The spot of the year from last year’s G1 is repeated expertly. Okada should have seen that coming. He fights to his feet but Nakamura takes him back down and cranks the shit out of the armbar for the tap out. And I can breathe again! What a fucking main event. What a fucking show! Final Rating: ****3/4 Picks: 66/90. One match remaining. Let’s check out the final standings in Block B:BLOCK B:Shinsuke Nakamura 14 – Winner! Kazuchika Okada 14Karl Anderson 12Hirooki Goto 12Tomohiro Ishii 10Michael Elgin 8Yujiro Takahashi 6Satoshi Kojima 6Yuji Nagata 6Tomoaki Honma 2Sad that Honma lost to Yujiro, what a crock of shit that was. Nice to see wins for both the veterans to improve their standing to six points and Ishii advancing to a deserved ten points. He was out-fucking-standing at times during G1. Including his last three or four matches. They’ve all been great. Summary: The best show of the tour so far. Two MOTYC’s for the crowd who’ve been moaning about a lack of them and what matches they were. Ishii vs. Elgin was the hardest hitting of all the hard-hitters in this year’s tournament. Nakamura vs. Okada, a dramatic masterpiece in storytelling. The rest of the card was pretty good, barring Honma’s agonising defeat to Yujiro. You don’t have to keep jobbing him. Having him lose to Yujiro made the Ishii win look like a fluke. Otherwise a fine evening of wrestling. One night to go and G1 isn’t done yet. Verdict: 100